Kathy Graves Jaqua
October 19, 1945 - February 20, 2017
Kathy Graves Jaqua passed away peacefully at the age of 71 at her San Francisco home for the past twenty-five years; succumbing to a ten years’ illness with the progressive connective tissue disease, Scleroderma. She was recently predeceased by her mother Dee Graves in Napa and by her younger brother Dwight and earlier by her loving father Leo Graves.
Kathy was born in Kansas and raised in Napa California with her mother, a well-known artist in Napa County, and younger siblings Dwight, Randy, and Jeannene. As a teenager she was an accomplished violinist and won Miss Napa County in the Miss Americas Pageant; later briefly pursuing a fashion modeling career. She enjoyed a lifelong love for science and sci-fi movies. She was a talented artist and an avid tennis player. She lived most of her adult life happily in the Bay Area in Napa, Marin, and San Francisco counties where she was also involved in societal and fund raising charitable causes.
She received her B.A. degree at USF where she went on to pursue graduate studies in the physiological sciences with some studies in nursing before embarking on a lifetime professional career in Macintosh computer programming.
She is described by family, friends and colleagues in their sympathies as: “a loving angel; “a sweet and gentle spirit; “joyous and always happy; “sweet, caring and smart; “most special and most caring; “a wonderful and loving partner; “admired for her love, tenderness, sensitivity, and passionate sweetness; “loving and caring; and “an enormous loss of a brilliant and beautiful person.” “The world lost a loving woman, Heaven gained a sweet angel.”
She is survived by her devoted life partner of twentyfive years Stephen Karpman, M.D. and his son Eric; her beloved and loyal sister Jeannene Craft of Napa and Oregon; her younger brother Randy Graves; and by caring friends Zulema Custodio and Jose Chavez, and her playful two-year-old pet Yorkie, Daisey, and by so many wonderful friends she met along the way whose lives she touched with her gentle kindness.
Funeral arrangements were handled by the McAvoy O’Hara Evergreen Mortuary services. She wished to be cremated with her ashes spread under the garden tree and at a family resort in a small private gathering at Goat Rock Beach north of Bodega Bay. We will all remember Kathy in our prayers.